So it is done

Memories

Time travel is possible.

Difficult, extremely difficult, but still in the realms of the possible for the Awakened.

However, this is the prerogative of Ars Temporis, and I have a rather superficial understanding of the art — no more than any other bani Bonisagus, and certainly less than some in the House of Scientists.

But still, sometimes when I close my eyes, it seems to me that I am capable of the art...

It's like that when I close my eyes, I was standing there again. In hell.

People torn apart by Grimm, but I don't hear it. The soldiers are shooting — but I do not see the volley of lead and fire, of the flickering figures of defiance fighting to the last.

The earth is shaking, but I don't feel it.

But I hear, see, feel something different, every time I return here, like the first time I did.

Tick.

It's as if the hand of time is shifting over and over again, relentlessly counting down the seconds.

Tock.

But, seconds before what? The end? Before the Grimm wipes out the remnants of the population? Before a miracle saves us all?

Tick.

I would like it if a miracle did happen. Indeed, I would like to. Who am I other than a random rogue in this situation?

Tock.

An apprentice who became a robber, then a murderer, then a father, and finally a smuggler... Certainly no hero that saves the day.

Tick.

What should I do? What to say? Whom to save? How to save?

Tock.

WHAT?!

Tick.

SHOULD?!

Tock.

I DO?!

Tick.

No answer.

Tock.

In the middle of Nowhere. You can neither look into the sky bereft of answers nor into the face of soldiers retreating over and over again in front of the rolling wave of... Monsters. Discarding all the dogmatic teachings of Order, they are monsters. Just monsters.

Tick.

Salvation will not come. Neither from the West nor the East. Neither from Above nor Below.

Tock.

Standing and looking into the eyes of those that remained standing, I see despair, and an Animalistic rage and madness, the desire to stand to the last, not to give up. And yet, through the haze of rage and defiance, resignation. A hidden acceptance, hidden even from their own thoughts. Acceptance of the inevitable.

Tick.

We all die. Nothing can be done about it, we will die. There would be no salvation, no hero to change the tides

Tock.

We were all lazy, stupid, and greedy. We are all humans in the end. Our vices have not changed since the time of Babylon. Since the days when we lived in caves and hunted mammoths. Our hopes and dreams have stayed the same as well.